In simple English
This tool helps developers run background tasks that take a long time to finish. Standard web servers usually stop a script after a few seconds. This platform lets tasks run for hours, days, or even weeks without stopping. It handles automatic retries if something fails, queues tasks in order, and lets you pause work until a human approves it. You can use their cloud service or run the system on your own servers.
What it is
Trigger.dev is an open-source platform for building and running long-running tasks and AI agents using TypeScript. It provides a software development kit (a set of tools for programmers) and a management dashboard to track every step of a running job.
What it is good for
Solo builders who need to run web scraping, video processing, or multi-step AI agent workflows that take longer than standard server limits allow.
- No time limits on background task execution.
- Built-in automatic retries and task queues.
- Supports pausing tasks for human approval.
- Requires writing code in TypeScript.
- Self-hosting needs Docker or Kubernetes experience.
- Cloud version requires trusting an external platform with your job data.
manual serverless cron jobs with custom retry logic and database state tracking
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npx @trigger.dev/cli@latest init